This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
As I cruised out one evening upon a night's career
I spied a lofty clipper ship and to her I did steer
I heisted out my signals which she so quickly knew
And when she saw my bunting fly she immediately hove to-woo-woo
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
Oh pardon me, she says to me, for being out so late
But if my parents heard of this all sad would be my fate
My father is in politics, a good and righteous man
My mother is an acrobat, I do the best I can
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
I took her for some fish and chips and treated her so fine
And hardly did I realize she was the rovin' kind
I kissed her lips, I missed her lips and found to my surprise
She was nothin' but a pirate ship rigged up in a disguise
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
So, come all you good sailor men who sail the wintry sea
And come, all you apprentice lads, a warnin' take from me
Beware of lofty clipper ships, they'll be the ruin of you
For 'twas there she made me walk the plank and pushed me under, too
She had a dark and rovin' eye-uh-eye and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
I spied a lofty clipper ship and to her I did steer
I heisted out my signals which she so quickly knew
And when she saw my bunting fly she immediately hove to-woo-woo
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
Oh pardon me, she says to me, for being out so late
But if my parents heard of this all sad would be my fate
My father is in politics, a good and righteous man
My mother is an acrobat, I do the best I can
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
I took her for some fish and chips and treated her so fine
And hardly did I realize she was the rovin' kind
I kissed her lips, I missed her lips and found to my surprise
She was nothin' but a pirate ship rigged up in a disguise
She had a dark and rovin' eye, and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
So, come all you good sailor men who sail the wintry sea
And come, all you apprentice lads, a warnin' take from me
Beware of lofty clipper ships, they'll be the ruin of you
For 'twas there she made me walk the plank and pushed me under, too
She had a dark and rovin' eye-uh-eye and her hair hung down in ringlets
She was a nice girl, a proper girl but one of the rovin' kind
Lyrics submitted by SongMeanings
The Roving Kind Lyrics as written by Jessie Cavanaugh Arnold Stanton
Lyrics © T.R.O. INC.
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The Roving Kind [Traditional English Folk Song] song meanings
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